Resolve

Let’s be honest, what person out there doesn’t like receiving a personal, hand-written letter in the mail? Make no mistake, snail mail may be considered old fashioned, but in the world of advocacy, it still packs a punch. When it comes to influencing your Members of Congress, a hand-written letter expressing your concerns is powerful.

Here’s what to do:

1. Find out who your Members of Congress are and get their contact information:

Visit www.house.gov or www.senate.gov, type in your state or zip code to get the information you need. Mail your letter to the DC office of your Members of Congress. 

2. Get an update on what your Members of Congress have done on this issue:

Click here to see if any of your Members of Congress have already committed to read the President's strategy. Also, visit Resolve’s Congressional Scorecards to see if any of your Members of Congress co-sponsored the bill or took other action on this issue. If so, it would be great to thank them for their support and leadership in your letter!

 3. Write your letter:

We’ve provided a sample letter below to make things easier for you. Your own story is powerful, so we also encourage you to personalize your letter, adding a bit about why you care about this issue and what you have done to bring more attention to the LRA crisis.

***********Sample Letter*************

[Your Name]
[Your Address]
[Today's Date]

[Member of Congress]
[Address of DC Office]
Re: LRA violence in central Africa and the implementation of S.1067

Dear _____________________________,

I am a constituent from _____________________, and I am writing to express my deep concern about atrocities being committed by the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA) in central Africa and to ask for your engagement in helping to protect civilians and bring lasting peace to the region.

After ravaging northern Uganda for two decades, the LRA has now spread into Sudan, DR Congo, and the Central African Republic and is destabilizing the entire region. They have killed more than 2,000 people, displaced over 380,000, and abducted more than 2,500 people—many of them children who they force to become child soldiers or sex slaves—in the past two years alone.

In May, you joined with your fellow Members of Congress in passing the LRA Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act (S.1067), requiring President Obama to develop a comprehensive strategy to help permanently end the crisis, to be released this November.

****If your Member of Congress cosponsored the bill and/or took other action, include a short thank-you here****

I am writing this letter to ask you to make a public statement of commitment to read and respond to the President's LRA strategy, in an effort to ensure that it will be one truly strong enough to bring a permanent end to LRA atrocities.

I hope we can work together make peace a reality for the children and families being victimized by this horrible crisis, and I look forward to your reply.

Thank you,
[Your name]
[Home address and email]